About
WHAT DOES “PSNT” MEAN?
It stands for “positive science negative theology.” By positive-negative we don’t mean good-bad, but positive as in positivism and negative as in apophasis.
Being interested in these things, whenever I get the chance I ask people what they think about the big bang, evolution, and God. That is, I ask them for their views on “science and religion.” As a former astronomy professor and seminary student I have had many such chances. And there often comes a response that indicates that the two are opposed. It’s easy to see why many would think so, what with the existence of people like Richard Dawkins and places like the Creation Museum.
Yet many also say, “I see no contradiction.” But it’s really not that easy either. When one gets down to business one finds a host of issues that makes one really wonder about how God could be the way we think God is and, simultaneously, the universe be the way we think the universe is. In the face of this one can move ahead with the hard work of reconciling these fundamental poles of human understanding, or not.
IF YOU DON’T care to reconcile science and religion, then you are quite safe reading Dawkins or visiting the museum, depending on your philosophy. Atheists in this group will find nothing but comfort in Dawkins, and creationists in this group will find nothing but comfort at the Creation Museum.
IF YOU DO care to reconcile science and religion, congratulations. You are one of the many who take both science and religion seriously. And you should still read Dawkins and go the museum. There are many ways to approach this reconciliation (read about some of them in Chapter 1 of Ian Barbour’s book Religion in the Age of Science here), and psnt.net is about one of them. It may be called “Positive Science Negative Theology” (or “PSNT”), although that’s a pretty awkward phrase. But it is — so far as I can tell — unlike any other approach out there. PSNT is pro-rationality; we love to think. here at psnt.net But we are skeptical regarding rationalism.
For PSNT, the Christian contemplative tradition and its so-called via negativa (“Way of Negation”) provides the fundamental (but not whole) approach to science and theology. What this means is, to put it simply:
IN RESPONSE TO THE QUESTION, HOW CAN GOD BE THE WAY WE THINK GOD IS, AND, SIMULTANEOUSLY, THE UNIVERSE BE THE WAY WE THINK THE UNIVERSE IS?, WE SAY THAT, MORE OFTEN THAN NOT,
GOD IS NOT THE WAY WE THINK GOD IS.
Thanks for reading,
There are 20 Comments to "About"
Paul,
Very interesting site…you make good points. I like when friends get a little out of the main stream and encourage others to think.
Love to all!
Beau
I was excited to stumble across this site after I went to your PSNT lecture a while back at Berry. I look forward to reading a little more. It’s a good refresher so far. I hope things are well.
I’m really glad I found your website…it’s very much like mine except that mine is very new.
I look forward to reading and comparing and thinking about your views. I’ve made a link to your site as well. Please have a look at mine and feel free to link as well ;)
Hi Paul;
Thanks for linking to my website…it gives me encouragement. However if you could, I’ve changed it to http://nakedtheology.talkingwalls.ca, so could you change your link. Thanks.
The cause of this is just being a green horn:) Someone suggested that it made more sense, and of course it does.
Again I REALLY enjoy your blog.
I sure enjoyed reading through your blog! I went in chronological order so that I could get a good sense for what you were trying to do with it. I’m sure that it gives you great comfort to know that I blazed through 5 months of your life and work in a few hours. I plan on keeping up with it from now on, so you keep writing them and I’ll keep reading them (from now on a bit more thoughtfully and carefully). Your writing seems thought-out and with purpose, as your lectures always did. Well thought-out lectures and assignments are at a premium here at GT, so it’s refreshing to revisit the time in my life when my professors cared about the subject they taught and their students (Yourself, Todd, Chuck, McDowell, and Ron especially).
As you express your thoughts and opinions, I wanted to encourage you to not be overly concerned with being mis-interpreted, instead to say what is on your mind and heart whenever such inspiration comes. I say this because I most enjoy the parts in your writing where you do this seemingly without reserve. The God that you and I love and worship cannot misinterpret your words (as they are just signs…right) because he knows your heart (the signified…I think I’m catching on).
I enjoyed your lobster post a lot for its strong analogies and mental pictures. Also, it builds on something that either you or Chuck told us in class one day about how “education/learning is usually a matter of finding out that whatever you learned last semester was all a bunch of crap” (I’m paraphrasing of course).
Well, I finally got here. I think you need more information on this site. (Is sarcasm permitted?) As a Buddhist, I have no conflicts with science and my faith, as scientific laws are part of what we call the Mystic Law of the universe. I think what you’re doing is fascinating, and I really like the look of your site. Best wishes as you explore the inner and outer galaxies.
It appears you still start with the assumption of god. If not an assumption, I’m interested in the process of though that brings you to this conclusion.
I’d also like to know what evidence you have for this alternative way of knowing you are positing.
Phil, I’m afraid I can’t show you any chain of logic that leads me to the conclusion: There is a God. If I tried to make one up it would be disingenuous, not to mention tedious as hell.
And, other than what I’ve already mentioned here, I have no incontrovertible evidence for this third way of seeing.
This is because — and you may hate this — “process of thought” does not apply and “objective evidence” does not apply. I am not like the apologists who attack you and argue with you on your site. I’ve got no proof texts, no appeals to authority, no scientific claims to back me up, no silly argument from design, none of that. I just won’t bite. I’m not trying to be anti-intellectual; it’s just that I’ve got no chain of hard logic I’m going to put out there. I could do it, I suppose, and I have done it a lot in the past. Heck, if I were to try to do it right now, I may even make some sense. But I just don’t want to because that is totally against what I want to do with my life and with this website. There are plenty of others out there in the blogosphere making arguments in favor of God’s existence; what I do is different.
P.
Hi Paul,
Mia offered the link and I adore the joining of science and religion, bless you. I don’t have time at the moment for much extra reading (I’m an M.Div. student), but will offer you this…I perceive no conflict between the spiritual (spirit filled) and the scientific (science) worlds. But…the inflictive troubles found in limited thought processes generally imposed on others by the prejudiced and therefore challenged human beings remains a perennial and consistent problem. What is wonderful – is you’re creating a forum for dialogue, exchange and exploration to offer up a third option for those who only comprehend in the either/or world of religion or science. The third option is quite beautiful indeed.
I am curious about the name choice “Positive Science – Negative Theology” what is the genesis of this name?
Keep up this good work.
Hi Kathleen. Thanks for the good word. The whole positive science-negative theology thing is of my own invention. “Positive science” refers to the kind of knowledge that science provides: knowledge about things, knowledge that is put in positive language: “Saturn is made of x,” “electrons have x charge,” “a platypus is a mammal but lays eggs,” that kind of thing.
Negative theology is a very particular kind of theology that starts by saying what God is not, and not what God is. I just put up a post here that may help to describe it more clearly than I can do in this note.
Thanks so much for reading,
Paul
Whilst you jay mean “simple tenants”, you possibly (probably?) mean “simple tenets”.
Thanks, fixed it. BTW, that’s quite a handle you have there: Speeling Nazi. Never seen its like before.
Dad,
I really think you put some thought into what you write before you write what is basically your job. My main question is what is your strategy? Of good writing? It would be so totally awesome if your secret was sitting down at Yogli Mogli for an hour with your laptop and working on your blogsite.
All smiles,
Julia Bulia
“GOD IS NOT THE WAY WE THINK GOD IS.”
“THE UNIVERSE IS NOT THE WAY WE THINK THE UNIVERSE IS.”
“ANYTHING IS NOT THE WAY WE THINK ANYTHING IS.”
Just a thought! :-)
But hear is the rub: EVERYTHING is ONLY the way we THINK it is, for we apprehend nothing except by our thought structure. Is there something out there that is objectively itself? Perhaps. Have you ever noticed a word you never encountered before – yet while re-reading something read long, long ago, there is that word?
Was that word really there before I noticed it? Hmmmm.
Rev. Dave
Hi Rev Dave. Thank you so much for reading and commenting.
You say: “Everything is only the way we think it is, for we apprehend nothing except by our thought structure.”
I can’t agree, because I think things can be known outside of discursive reason. It is precisely this unsayable “knowledge” that poets and artists and novelists try to convey. They can’t say it by saying it, so they say what’s next to it, or some such. If life were simply a matter of thought structure, we would need only philosophy of a certain narrow stripe. Seems to me.
Re. your comment below about “mythological structure” — you may be right that you cannot incorporate the myths of one structure while standing in another. But it’s not obvious to me that this is true. I am thinking of Weil’s way of dealing with this — she saw analogies between major mythological systems and thought that all if them are mostly true.
I think this is possible to do, but perhaps the only way to do it from within a given system — Christianity, say — is to hold onto that system as the penultimate expression of the truth, while other systems — Greek myth, say — are seen as echoes or precursors or some such.
And you don’t need to me a universaliist to think so — even C.S. Lewis believed something like this to be true.
P.
I probably overstated. (I often do.) When I say “mythological structure,” I’m not talking about myth in the sense of a group of non-factual stories – whether Christianity or Greek. I am more pointing to the work of Joseph Campbell who identified differences and underlying notions in all human faith systems. A mythological structure is bound up in language, assumptions, cosmologies, transcendental conceptions, and cultural saga and story.
As an example, I understand that Inuit tribes have dozens (or more) words for snow that describe all the variations they witness in their environment. We have snow plus a few adjectives (known by those who ski!). We thus cannot see or name subtle differences. Yes – there IS snow, and the variations are real. We just cannot wrap our minds around them.
Even more so when it comes to transcendent issues. In Sunday’s sermon (I am a UMC elder), I said that when I refer to God, I am talking about that which is beyond the time and space of our universe, in which time and space exists. That this universe has been moving toward conscious awareness over the last 14 billion years implies that that which is beyond and in which we exist has (in a way we cannot truly fathom) conscious awareness and is the cause of this universe. This is too much to say very often, so I just say, “God,” and am mostly misunderstood.
The problem we face in the Christian world today is a disconnect between our cosmology and the cosmology of the Bible. In that, we probably need a new theology and new ways of speaking of such things (or in the case of God, not-thing).
Only a smiling visitant here to share the really like (:, btw fantastic design and style .
I am interested in the “mythological structure” of faith – and you seem to apprehend the same thing. I am not sure one can stand within one mythological structure and incorporate the tenets of another – which is at the heart of most nasty theological discussions. I am with you that God is not who we think God is, and I would add that the entire ministry of Jesus was to make this clear.
Thanks
Rev. Dave
I would go a bit further than your comment above. I cannot fully appreciate another person’s boat as long as I stay in my own boat, nor if I only compare the outside in relation to my own. I can, for short spurts, step out of my boat and tour another’s boat for what it is – knowing that this is not my boat but a boat nonetheless. Then I return to my own mythological structure boat to see what I might do to incorporate new insights.